Ian Campbell (WA, Liberal Party, Minister for the Environment and Heritage) Share this | Hansard source

It is probably a good thing, Senator Ludwig, but it does show a great contempt for the Senate when someone effectively moves a motion attacking a minister, yells and screams for 15 minutes, deceives the Senate and then skulks out of the chamber because he does not want to be corrected.

Mr Acting Deputy President, can I firstly make the point that, as Senator Ludwig will know because he has actually had legal training, when you have a consent order from a court it is in fact an agreement. It was an agreement between the proponent, Wind Power Pty Ltd, and me that we would go to the court and suggest a process. It was fully agreed; there was no disagreement with the proponent. We would go to the court and say, ‘Right, this is a good way forward.’

The only attack that you could possibly make on the process is that Wind Power, the proponents, did not have access to the cumulative impact report. The only reason they did not have access to it is that they informed us that they wanted to take legal action to force me to make a decision. So instead of coming to us and saying, ‘Can we have a look at the report?’ they came to us and said, ‘Please make a decision.’ We made a decision. I think it is entirely appropriate that they have access to the report so they have had access to it since April. They have had a lot of access to it. They have said, and I have agreed, that we will look at another submission on this proposal. I think it is an incredibly sensible way to go forward.

Senator Carr also said that the orange-bellied parrot had not been sighted at this particular location and that it did not even fly through it. ‘It has never been spotted’ I think were the words he used. The best thing that Senator Carr could do for this whole process is to get it out in the open. We have put all of the documents out there for the public to see. Senator Carr talked about the cumulative impact study, and that is a study of the impact on migratory species across that whole coastline. You would know from your own state, Mr Acting Deputy President, that these wind turbines do have significant impacts on birds. You have lost three endangered wedge-tailed eagles in Tasmania in the last three months.

We know that the Victorian Labor comrades of Senator Carr have played fast and loose with the truth on this issue, and they have hidden from the people of Victoria and from the people of Australia the information that puts the lie to what Senator Carr said in the Senate today. When the proposal came to my department the Victorian government sent up this huge wad of material in relation to the proposal. What they did not send up was this document which Mr Hulls still keeps secret from the Australian people. Senator Carr should read it. In fact, I will not even bother him with that effort because I know he struggles when it comes to effort, except when it comes to bellowing air through his lungs and vocal chords and making himself hoarse.

But what did the report say to Mr Hulls? His own department, the Department of Sustainability and Environment of Victoria, says under the heading ‘orange-bellied parrot’:

The Bald Hills wind farm proposal will increase the level of threat to the orange-bellied parrot.

It was not in any of their documents. That stack is what they sent to Canberra. I would have loved to have been the courier who got the contract for that. This document was missing, though. We know why now: because Senator Carr and his comrades in Victoria wanted to cover it up and hide it from the people of Victoria. What does it go on to say?

The department agrees that the orange-bellied parrot is unlikely to utilise the site. However—

this is the bird that does not go anywhere near the site, does not go through the site—that is what Senator Carr said to the Senate—

it is highly likely that the orange-bellied parrots commuting between habitat patches in South Gippsland will fly across the site. Their commuting flights are often at heights encompassed by the rotor swept area.

That will be news to Senator Allison who, without any ill will, said in Senate estimates that these birds do not fly at those heights.